Emco pc mill 55 upgrade

[Craiggillzzr1400zx10r]

Hi all, im new to the cnc thing and are looking for guidance/assistance on my upgrade on my emco pc mill 55, i have a full kit, steppers, breakout board etc for the upgrade but being a complete novice am a bit dazed and confused, can anyone help, thanks in advance

[gavztheouch]

I have a emco mill 50 that I plan to convert to mach at some point.

I would start with mounting your new stepper motors. I think the oringinal pulleys are actually held in place using a roll pin straight through the pulley and shaft, but I have seen people just using grub screws or even glue. Get the old steppers out and have a look, spend some time just looking over the machine to formulate a plan and post plenty of pictures here to get advice and fill us all in.

Have you been using the mill 55 with the old software? Alot of folks say there is no need to convert to mach as the software is actually not to bad.

[EddyCurrent]

I know nothing about this machine but I'm curious to know this. If it already has steppers why change them ? also if the supplied software is not too bad why convert to Mach3 ?

[gavztheouch]

The Steppers have something unique about them which means they cannot be driven with standard stepper drives so most people switch them out. you can also uprate them to improve feedrates as the oringials were a bit underwhelming

I purchase my emco with the intension of mounting a high speed spindle instead of the heavy duty emco slow standard one. The idea was to use it to 3d profile small aluminium molds where high rpms are needed for the cutters to get a decent finish. Then I started reading about edm sinkers and I though it would also be great for milling electrodes for the edm.

[Craiggillzzr1400zx10r]

Thanks for reply, i can install steppers fairly easily and the other electronics, my main problem is making sure i have everything wired corectly plus my big problem is how to run the spindle with speed controll, i have no idea what i need or how i need to do this, the kit i have bought is a digital stepper setup with all the bells and whistles , BOB etc from CNC4U, ideally i am looking for someone to help hands on with the conversion as i am a bit out of my league and dont want to blow anything up ��

[Craiggillzzr1400zx10r]

This is the kit i have

[EddyCurrent]

Is there any info on the net regarding the electrics of your machine as it is now ?

[Craiggillzzr1400zx10r]

The machine kind if works now as i bought it with pc an a fanuc control but its all very dated and possibly problematic if there are problems now or in the future so iv opted to retrofit with all new internal electronics and druves so i can use standardised software etc, but, i am very limited in my knowledge of all this so "here i am"
Ideally im looking for someone locally to me, midlands, who i could pay to come and help out/advise etc as a wrongly wired up anything could be costly

[EddyCurrent]

I was mainly thinking about the spindle motor speed control, I don't know if it is currently AC or DC
As you say someone local would be ideal, especially if you're not so confident even with the right information.

[Craiggillzzr1400zx10r]

Im sure given the right info etc i can sort it but im very impatient lol, as far as the motor i think its 3 phase so if im correct id need to run it through a VFD that would be connected to the break out board somehow, this is wat iv got info wise in the motor tho

Any assistanceis much appreciated